by Gareth Smyth Out this month from Penguin Random House, Beirut Rules is a breathless tale of good against evil. On one side is William Buckley, the CIA Beirut chief who died in captivity after his kidnapping in 1984. On… Continue Reading
by Gareth Smyth After abandoning the 2015 nuclear agreement signed by the Obama administration with Iran and five world powers, the Trump administration has returned to past American notions of Iran’s Islamic Republic being either overthrown or weakened to the… Continue Reading
by Gareth Smyth In threatening Iran with the “strongest sanctions in history,” Secretary of State Mike Pompeo was probably not thinking of the Mongol sieges of Iranian cities. Two days later, however, Ayatollah Ali Khamenei evoked Iranians’ sense of their… Continue Reading
by Gareth Smyth In 2007, when the Iranian government introduced gasoline rationing, increasing the price to 11 cents a liter, some angry motorists torched gasoline stations. Israeli Prime Minister Ehud Olmert said that it showed “economic sanctions are working increasingly… Continue Reading